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Paul Ryan crashes Dem party in N.C.

Gary Pearce, a longtime North Carolina Democratic strategist, said it’s not the least bit surprising that the GOP would dispatch Romney’s most effective spokesman to the state to try to draw attention from the Democratic convention that officially kicks off on Tuesday.

“All the attention for the convention being here in North Carolina will help Obama in the state and they’ve got to do something to counter that,” Pearce said. “It’s a function of you all in the news cycle. Both sides want to be in every news cycle and the there’s nothing new about that, going to the other party’s convention and crashing the party. Nobody wants to just let the other side have a free and unchallenged shot.”

While Romney spent the first half of Monday boating with his wife Ann in Wolfeboro, N.H., Ryan delivered a message to voters in Greenville that focused largely on the weak economy.

“In 1980 under Jimmy Carter, 330,000 businesses filed for bankruptcy. Last year, under President Obama’s failed leadership, 1.4 million businesses filed for bankruptcy,” he said (after Ryan’s speech, a spokesman said the congressman meant to say total bankruptcy filings including personal and business — not just business).

“Simply put, the Jimmy Carter days look like the good old days compared to where we are right now. And so that’s why we have a very crystal clear choice,” Ryan added. “We can either choose to stay on the path that we are on, a path of debt, a path of doubt and decline, a path of joblessness, or we can get things turned around. ”

The Obama camp shrugged off Ryan crashing their party as they insisted that North Carolinians have a strong grasp of the “fundamentally different” visions that Romney and Obama have for the future of the country.

“Last week in Tampa, North Carolinians heard nothing from Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan except blatantly false attacks on the president and empty rhetoric,” wrote Adam Fetcher, Obama for America’s deputy national press secretary, in an email. “They won’t be distracted by Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan’s false [belief] that cutting taxes for millionaires and billionaires on the backs of the middle class will magically create jobs — because it never has in the past.”

Readers' Comments (29)

Photo Illustration by DonkeyHotey via Flickr/Special to The Politics Blog

I was struck by the revelation in this morning's paean to zombie-eyed granny-starving in the Times, that young, up-from-the-muddy-bootstraps Paul Ryan, the plucky burger-flippin' success story from darkest Janesville, Wisconsin, had amassed a fortune of "between three and $7.7 million" without having held a more lucrative job than "Congressman" at any point in his adult life. Then, I noticed another item. Namely, that:

Mr. Ryan reported two tax-deferred college savings plans, with a combined value of between $150,000 and $300,000. He also reported two investment partnerships worth, in total, between $350,000 and $750,000, mostly containing shares of stock in well-known companies, including Apple, Goodrich, Kraft Foods, Visa and Whole Foods. Both partnerships were formed by Mr. Ryan and other family members to manage assets left by his grandparents and an aunt. Mrs. Ryan has reported receiving a trust after her mother died in 2010 that is valued between $1 million and $5 million, according to a letter Mr. Ryan filed with his latest financial disclosure. Mrs. Ryan also has longstanding interests in several mining and oil exploration investments in Oklahoma and Texas managed by her father, Dan Little, a lawyer in Oklahoma whose clients include oil and gas companies. Those investments generated as much as $150,000 in income last year.

So, he's not the son of poor Smallville dirt farmer Jonathan Kent and his wife, Martha, after all. Where does the family dough come from? A construction company founded by Great Grandpa Ryan. The Rude Pundit went a'wandering through Googlestan, and what did he find? Among other great nuggets, this thing right here:

"The Ryan workload from 1910 until the rural interstate Highway System was completed 60 years later, was mostly Highway construction."

This, of course, partly explains the outburst of Weaselspeak that Ryan dropped on Ryan Lizza of The New Yorker when Lizza cornered him at the logical end of all of the government-bashing on which he'd built his career.

When I pointed out to Ryan that government spending programs were at the heart of his home town's recovery, he didn't disagree. But he insisted that he has been misunderstood. "Obama is trying to paint us as a caricature," he said. "As if we're some bizarre individualists who are hardcore libertarians. It's a false dichotomy and intellectually lazy." He added, "Of course we believe in government. We think government should do what it does really well, but that it has limits, and obviously within those limits are things like infrastructure, interstate highways, and airports."

We think government should also do those things on which my family traditionally has been able to turn a pretty buck, so I could one day buy the handsome Georgian mansion back home that is on the National Register of Historic Places. Two days ago, as he joined the ticket led by presidential candidate G.I. Luvmoney, formerly employed by the game of Life, this is what Paul Ryan, whose owes his family fortune to government construction projects said:

"I'm proud to stand with a man who understands what it takes to foster job creation in our economy, someone who knows from experience, that if you have a small business — you did build that."

His entire life, and the history of his entire family, makes a lie out of everything the man has said in his political career, and a sham out of every policy position he purports to hold. It seems to be there used to be a word for that. What I do know is that, in 20 years, a lot of people in the Beltway who are in my business today are going to look at what they've written and said about this faker, and drink themselves into early graves.

Food for thought…….The first thing out of the republicans collective mouths after the President was elected was….”Our first priority is to make President Obama a one term president“. It appears that they have tried to live up to that promise. In fact, it has represented their sole effort for nearly four years.

The thought occurred to me that this has been a badly misguided approach. I would have thought their first priority would have been to help restore the economy and help create jobs. But no, they have put themselves before the good of the people and country. For this betrayal to America, I believe we must re-elect President Obama, and support him with majorities in the House and Senate and give him four more years to finish the economic recovery.

Oh yeah…Where are romneys tax returns? He’s hiding SOMETHING!

With respect to ryan's trouble with the truth...he even lies about his marathon time....

just wonder what the message is #1 tries to tell. I didn't hear that Ryan said that he is poor today but that his mom did start a business after his dad died and there was no mention about Mrs. Ryan upbringing anyway ..... so what is the story here?

#2 : actually Obama promised to be a one term Prez only based on his poor performance. The turn around should have started with the stimulus money ... there was no shovel ready infrastructure, but Union ready jobs and jobs for other cronies. Just take GM as an example: he wasted our money for the Unions ... other companies go to bankruptcy very successfully too w/o taking tax payers money (see US Airways and many more). Now after he wasted the infrastructure shovel money already he asks for another try .... I can only see an ever "emptier" chair coming for him.

Did ole Joe give them an idea ? And.....did everyone see the video of 'Da man his-self' speaking at the Janesville GM Plant at Breitbart ? Just maybe Ryan isn't such a liar after all.Go watch for yourself.

liberalold guy...can you tell me an Party that has ever existed that it wasn't their plan to make their opposition a one term President? And thank GOD they stopped him...a little bit. Have you seen his newest Green Energy Power grab? Check out The Blaze

If he is mindful of his political future, Ryan needs to take greater care lest the words he is now assigned to utter by R-R campaign handlers, words of falsehood as well as words of truth, prove toxic when revisited in the future.

Are you serious MJ Lee? Why would you blatantly LIE about the turnout for Paul Ryan today? There were thousands of supporters that turned out and people were lined up for blocks.

Politico and the rest of the MSM are not going to be able to continue to lie and cover up for Obama!

This is NOT 2008! This is 2012 and Obama has failed and has no possible chance of being re-elected. He can't get a national approval rating above 50% .... a clear indicator that he's un-electable.

His support has waned and he has nothing to run on! Please do us all a favor and stop fabricating crap .... I demand a correction to your story that Ryan only had hundreds that showed up ..... Please be honest and tell the TRUTH!!!

Here are the pictures from today to prove that there were thousands that showed up in support of Romney/Ryan!!

To those of you who are buying into this wonderful con job of Romney/Ryan, do you remember in the fall of 2008, when there was a serious chance the banks would fail????? Their UN-REGULATED investments almost took down this entire economy. Mr. Romney wants to roll back those 'NASTY" regulations that the Democrats enacted to keep it from happening again. He also wants boots on the ground in Syria and has said (II heard him say it) that he would bomb Iran........So, more wars and no regulation of Wall Street.........Been there, done that and it was a disaster. Trash Obama all you want--he pulled us back from going over the cliff; saved the auto industry, got Bin Laden and is trying to reform our AWFUL health care system...........I have dear friends who are so grateful to have their diabetic 22 year old daughter on their health insurance...........All with NO cooperation from all those white faces in the Republican party......

The only people who want to return to those times are either toooo stupid to remember just how bad it was....or toooo racist to deal with their President being much smarter than they are!!!!! All that screaming about the deficit---guess what Romney's vaulted plan does to it???? No increase in revenue and probably wars off the books yet again...........Not one economist says his figures are accurate............

Mr. Ryan is a scam artist and while he may have a future in the party, which adores his youth and religious fervor about abortion---his figures don't match up either.......

the Republicans also have a bridge in Brooklyn for sale.......Wanna buy that, too?

People, do not trust Obama. Obama will say anything at the convention to be reelected. Why give 4 more years to the failure Obama? He will do the same things he has done these 3 and 1/2 years. So do not waste your vote and vote for Mitt Romney. Obama is destroying our country with bad policies and his criminals, illegal aliens. Let's replace Obama. Do not trust him. He is a communist. Obama wants to transform America (like Cuba). Are we going to let him transform America? We will not.